About Rationally Speaking

Rationally Speaking is a blog maintained by Prof. Massimo Pigliucci, a philosopher at the City University of New York. The blog reflects the Enlightenment figure Marquis de Condorcet's idea of what a public intellectual (yes, we know, that's such a bad word) ought to be: someone who devotes himself to "the tracking down of prejudices in the hiding places where priests, the schools, the government, and all long-established institutions had gathered and protected them." You're welcome. Please notice that the contents of this blog can be reprinted under the standard Creative Commons license.

Friday, July 26, 2013

New Rationally Speaking collection: A Skeptics' Skeptic

What? Another Rationally Speaking collection? So soon? What can I say, it’s summer, and I really like putting together these e-booklets of selected essays from the blog (this is the fifth, the second this year...). The one you are hopefully holding on your iPad, Kindle, smart phone or whatever is one that I had thought about for a long time before assembling it.

You see, I’ve been writing about “skepticism” (meaning, taking a skeptical stance on pseudo-science, pseudo-philosophy, pseudo-politics, and a few other “pseudos”) since as far back as 1997, when I began organizing Darwin Day events at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. From time to time, over the intervening 16 or so years, I found myself turning my gadfly-sh keyboard toward other skeptics, usually famous ones.

The reason is that it seems to me that a community — such as the skeptic / atheist / humanist (S/A/H, for short) one — that prides itself in its intellectualism and openness to reason and evidence, ought to critically examine its own tenets and positions, especially when espoused by prominent members of said community. Indeed, one of the gratifying things about being a skeptic is precisely that, by and large, we don’t act like a church. We recoil from dogmas, and we don’t ostracize dissenting members of our community, immediately rushing to build a new church down the street. Or do we? Well, okay, the recent history of the S/A/H community actually does sometimes eerily recall religious schisms and doctrinal disputes. Still, at least we don’t burn people at the stakes, or launch fatwas against them!

The gentle reader will notice that several of the essays included in the Skeptics’ Skeptic collection are, ahem, quite ironic, even sarcastic at times, certainly more so than the typical Rationally Speaking post. There are reasons for that. To begin with, the people targeted here are Big Boys who can definitely take the heat (many are academics, and academics are selected for having a thick skin). Moreover, rest assured that they can (and have, in several cases!) fight back with equal or larger force.

But the most important explanation for my above-average forcefulness here is that I take public intellectualism seriously, and these people are somewhat major public intellectuals. They influence countless others, and they therefore bear the responsibility of writing rigorously as well as clearly. When they don’t (in my opinion, of course) I call them out.

It should go without saying, but I’ll say it any way: contra persistent insinuations to the contrary (by, say, The Discovery Institute, the inane “think tank” that promotes Intelligent Design creationism), these and other writings by yours truly do not signal the beginning of a move away from my philosophical naturalism, support for science, or defense of reason. They are simply cases in which I deploy precisely those tools to engage the best minds of the S/A/H, so that we as a broader movement can keep Carl Sagan’s famous “candle in the dark” alit against the always numerous and always powerful forces of obscurantism and repression.

28 comments:

I guess it is hard to promote rationality among people who claim to own rationality itself. I praise you that engaged yourself in such a tremendous (and magnificent and bold) task. However, I am quite skeptic about your success.

The so called 'skeptics community' remains mostly an enigma to me. Many of these self proclaimed intellectuals spew out vituperative, ad hominem type crap all the while maintaining a dispassionate search for the truth relying only on the tools of reason and science. To the innocent, humble bystander it is both comical and troubling. I think it was Mark Twain that once said something like 'to a great extent one's character can be determined by the adjectives he uses'. I think that is quite insightful and doesn't bode well for people such as Larry Moran or P.Z. Myers or the other so called skeptics I follow from time to time. That aside, why label oneself a skeptic? I mean we are skeptics to degree. Many times it is only caprice that ends our search for definitive truth. I also have a problem slinging around the word 'reason' in such a way to isninuate people in disagreement with a scientific or skeptic position to be using some other delusional cognitive process. And it seems skeptics obligately operate do that.

What confuses me about the skeptics is the "reach" of skepticism so to speak. On one hand, people often speak of the "skeptic/atheist community" as if skepticism and atheism were synonymes, or at least strongly tied to each other. On the other hans, people like Daniel Loxton insist that skepticism applies only to paranormal claims, no other claims, and absolutely not on the existence of gods (otherwise you are doing it wrong). Huh? It's probably for the better than Loxton doesn't get to dominate, as skepticism would probably almost die out if it was Bigfoot and Nessie all the time.

I'm also confused about what skepticism actually is, or scientific skepticism more precisely, since that's what organized skepticism is about. Michael Shermer has said that it is synonymous to science, Steven Novella sort of agrees (the podcast after all bills itself as a science podcast). Massimo Pigliucci disagrees. Yet they all keep operating under the skeptic umbrella without resolving what it actually is.

well, you may enjoy this episode of the RS podcast on the varieties of skepticism:http://www.rationallyspeakingpodcast.org/show/rs46-the-varieties-of-skepticism.html

Briefly about your points: I think there is a distinction between skepticism and atheism, but I disagree with Daniel that religious claims are somehow insulated or belong into a completely separate category. On the other hand, I think Shermer’s claim that skepticism is synonymous with science is downright silly, though a perfectly coherent part of his generally scientistic views.

Skepticism in the sense that we are talking about (as opposed to, say, in the technical philosophical one) is best described as a general stance stance about any claim whatsoever: “So, you say X. What are the reasons for believing X, and what sort of evidence do you have?”

Speaking about rationality. Apart from demanding "you say X. What are the reasons for believing X, and what sort of evidence do you have?", maybe skeptics, for the sake of coherence and intellectual honesty (something that I guess is missing in the skeptic comunity), should try to prove the validity of philosophical naturalism (or better said their faith in philosophical naturalism).

And when I mention "prove the validity of philosophical naturalism", I really mean something that must go well beyond the simple things science is able to explain (with a minimum of confidence), and, in this sense trying to address this faith (or confidence) on philosophical naturalism based on the success of science is absurd (and this faith is irrational).If human are committed to study nature using science and this study has proven successful, how could that effort be unsuccessful? Well, it could, if the nature was not ordered and regular or if we (humans) were incapable of detecting this regularity and order (but then is anybody claiming that it should be irregular or disordered or that we are incapable of observing it? I guess not).

>Shermer’s claim that skepticism is synonymous with science is downright silly<

Not sure I'd agree that Shermer is downright silly. While it's presumably not accurate to say that skepticism and science are precisely the same thing, you could perhaps argue that science is essentially applied skepticism?

Thanks for the reply Massimo, I'll listen to that episode at some point.

In ordinary language, "skepticism" means simply doubt. Paranormal debunkers have taken that word and in the case of Loxton (and to a lesser extent Novella etc) tried to limit it so as to only refer to doubting paranormal claims. Though judging by the actual content of Skeptic magazine (where he is a writer) it is clear that Loxton doesn't run the show there.

I'm not so sure that Shermer is on very shaky ground. Novella has recommended that people read the The Demon-Haunted World to understand what skepticism is about. I have read that book. It is essentially a book defending science, trying to teach scientific thinking to people, and a critical look at some popular but unfounded beliefs, especially alien abductions. It's not a book that stays within the limits Loxton would prefer.

By contrast, people like Dawkins and Krauss, whatever faults they have, don't often refer to themselves as skeptics (though they undoubtedly support the work of skeptical organizations) and thus are under no pressure to stay within the limits Loxton and others try to set for skeptics. They know their science and try to educate people. The mission statement of the RDFRS is clear and straightforward:

"Our mission is to support scientific education, critical thinking and evidence-based understanding of the natural world in the quest to overcome religious fundamentalism, superstition, intolerance and human suffering."

Likewise is Krauss' message to Pakistani atheists, but which of course applies to everyone: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vns_J0MwXFY

Thought I might jump in here briefly to clarify my positions (which are developed at much greater length here—PDF).

Massimo writes,

"I think there is a distinction between skepticism and atheism, but I disagree with Daniel that religious claims are somehow insulated or belong into a completely separate category."

It's not my position that religious claims are somehow insulated or belong into a completely separate category than the ordinary paranormal and fringe science fare that ("scientific") skeptics traditionally concentrate upon. Religions make paranormal and fringe science claims all the time, and skeptics have always happily dug into those. My position is that claims that can be investigated by any evidence-based means are different than claims that cannot. Skeptics traditionally deal in the former, and ignore the latter, regardless of the religious implications of either the investigable or non-investigble claims. Although skepticism has always been a multi-disiplinary field and is not synonymous with science, this is one of the things we have adopted from the ethos of science. Prudently, in my opinion.

I think Massimo and I largely agree with regards to Last Thursday-ism and the limits of science and so on. Where we diverge, if I understand this correctly, is in our opinions of whether it is most useful in practical terms to have a field of critical study that concentrates upon investigable paranormal and fringe science claims, or whether it would be better for such a field to also adopt a wider rationalism and attempt to debunk bad philosophical ideas that cannot be investigated through anything like empirical means. One reason (among many) that I prefer the former is that wider rationalisms packaged under the "scientific" banner lead to the exact sort of scientism that Massimo feels should be avoided. I would much rather that skeptics transparently emphasize the empirical limits of science than work to obscure them.

”…people like Daniel Loxton insist that skepticism applies only to paranormal claims, no other claims, and absolutely not on the existence of gods (otherwise you are doing it wrong). Huh?”

This is not exactly my position. It is my position that it remains appropriate for skepticism, if it is to continue to position itself as "science-based" or "evidence-based," to continue to limit itself to claims that can be illuminated at least in principle by science or evidence. I really don't care whether these claims are religious in character or not. This "testable claims" scope seems to feel quite limiting to some critics, but I am not sure that I understand why. It's actually absurdly broad—essentially, all discoverable facts or answerable questions about all things in the natural universe.

Because a field has to be about something in specific in order to be about anything at all, and because it is desirable for skeptics to avoid hubristic opining about expert domains we know little about (a temptation that has sometimes led skeptics to misstep or misrepresent the state of the research in fields such as climate science) I have argued that skeptics should avoid positioning ourselves as "everythingologists."

”Novella has recommended that people read the The Demon-Haunted World to understand what skepticism is about. I have read that book. It is essentially a book defending science, trying to teach scientific thinking to people, and a critical look at some popular but unfounded beliefs, especially alien abductions. It's not a book that stays within the limits Loxton would prefer.”

I also recommend The Demon-Haunted World as an accessible introduction to what skeptics are all about. It is not different than the scope of practice that I advocate. Skeptics always have and likewise always will defend science, try to teach scientific thinking to people, and offer critical examination at some popular but questionable beliefs. Much of my own work involves straightforward science advocacy or science popularization, for example, including my children's book Evolution: How We and All Living Things Came to Be (which was based upon Junior Skeptic content).

My position is not that straight science is out of scope for skeptics—it's isn't—but that as a practical matter it is useful for us to concentrate the lion's share of our effort on what I have called "our only unique contribution"—rigorous critical scholarship about fringe science and paranormal claims. It's never been the only thing we do, but it has traditionally been the central thing that we do. The reason is that this work is needed. Skeptics organized in the first place because fringe topics were too often neglected by mainstream scholarship. That largely remains the case.

I'd like to stress some points that could be of use in the self reflective process of the skeptic's core tenets, so that their main target keeps continuously at sight.

One must be continuously cautious to not make from true, good, useful skepticism a mere instrument of corporatism, mainly when the corporations that are favored by the skeptics' actions aren't able to provide that service which is supposed to be the right one in place of the one which is proved or supposed to be forgery or fringe science.

Take, for instance, some regions of what I call the oldest part of Brazil (northeastern region, the first to be explored by the Portuguese), where some traditions are kept alive and to a certain point supported by the government for several reasons, the main one, I believe, the remote possibility of maintaining permanent staffs of physicians in that area. So, there were, at least until a few time ago, a lot of practical physicians acting there, among them midwives, herbalists and rezadeiras (women - in general - who claim to heal by means of prayers). I believe that, besides the reason above, they are tolerated because the population itself supports their practices - so, they might have a good success rate from the point of view of the people whom they serve. I must also stress that the mentioned practices involve not just 'fringe science' - or whatever we call it -, but also what could be called 'paranormal' activities.

I'm trying to point to some facts that a good skeptic's practice must be constantly aware of (and I'd like to believe it indeed does), say, that before science reached it's recent baselines, all which men counted with was that kind of knowledge and techniques to solve their problems, although possessing a level of efficacy now considered by science as low or null; also, let me recall ourselves that the good scientifically generated technology isn't yet available all over the Earth and that science itself has its own issues with failure (I mean, science is not immune to imperfection).

All the enrolled above doesn't testify against science, naturally, although some shallow conclusions and actions surely do. So, in order to not even slightly look like a corporative warhead I suggest that the skepticism theme be dealt, mainly in the science field, with due care. (In philosophy it has a somewhat different utility.) Maybe it's time for science to start investigating why the 'laying of hands', prayers, scientifically untested herbalism and a long row of related practices are tolerated and even preferred by some individuals or communities, as long as they have no option to them or only because they're indeed satisfied with their success rates. It's possible that their practitioners are taking advantage of something not accurately observed and studied by science if, obviously, one is absolutely assured that they result from forgery.

While this doesn't apply to the "big boys", there are two I often encounter that greatly annoy me about skeptics (seems to be the thrust of the discussion):

1) Demanding ownership of the word "skeptic" i.e. "The press shouldn't use the phrase climate skeptics because they aren't real skeptics!!". This is of course taking the adapted meaning of scientific scepticism (did this start with Shermer's magazine?) and demanding it take priority over the vernacular and technical meanings.

2) Thinking discussing epistemology is odd.

3) Thinking skepticism cannot imply conservativism. What is conservatism if not a skepticism of new ideas?

> maybe skeptics, for the sake of coherence and intellectual honesty ... should try to prove the validity of philosophical naturalism <

Philosophical naturalism is by far the most sound philosophical position about the nature of the world. And it is supported any time that science makes a new discovery or produces a new successful theory. It’s also proven every time a miracle doesn’t happen in your personal life. What else could you possibly want? When was the last time that a supernaturalist philosophy produced something like the iPhone?

Disagreeable,

> While it's presumably not accurate to say that skepticism and science are precisely the same thing, you could perhaps argue that science is essentially applied skepticism? <

No, I maintain that Shermer’s attitude is indeed silly. Science of course includes a component of skepticism, but so does any other inquiry into any other field, so there is no privileged skepticism-science relationship.

Pyrrhus,

> I'm not so sure that Shermer is on very shaky ground. Novella has recommended that people read the The Demon-Haunted World to understand what skepticism is about <

See my comment above about Shermer. As for Steve, good advice, but I would add, say, David Hume’s Enquiry, and several other entries to that list.

downquark,

> Demanding ownership of the word "skeptic" i.e. "The press shouldn't use the phrase climate skeptics because they aren't real skeptics!!". <

Well, on that one I actually agree with the skeptics. In the hands of a climate change denier (notice my use of a derogatory term) the term “skeptic” becomes a joke.

> Thinking discussing epistemology is odd. <

Agreed, that’s bizarre.

> Thinking skepticism cannot imply conservativism. What is conservatism if not a skepticism of new ideas? <

No, I think there is an important distinction there. In fact, I’d argue that skeptic in the sense of conservative is precisely what skepticism is *not* about: it means being recalcitrant to accept new ideas, regardless of their value or of the evidence supporting them.

@Massimo, no you're doing the thing I'm complaining about. Skeptic has meaning outside of activist and philosophical circles, it means doubter. It doesn't mean justified doubter or someone with a commitment to scientific epistemology, it just means doubter.

You can't expect everyone to happily go along with an appropriation of an existing word. By all means use it to refer to the skeptic movement or the magazine etc.

You can't expect everyone to happily go along with an appropriation of an existing word. By all means use it to refer to the skeptic movement or the magazine etc. But you can't expect the whole world to do that in exclusivity.

"Skepticism in the sense that we are talking about (as opposed to, say, in the technical philosophical one) is best described as a general stance stance about any claim whatsoever: “So, you say X. What are the reasons for believing X, and what sort of evidence do you have?”" Massimo

"Science of course includes a component of skepticism, but so does any other inquiry into any other field, so there is no privileged skepticism-science relationship." Massimo

Doesn't it spring some sort of contrariety in the collation of these three phrases? Perhaps it's time to a new post on the issue, if you haven't one already (if so, please, post the link).

....

Well, generally speaking, I prefer to approach the subject as 'rationality' instead of 'skepticism'. I believe I'm a faithful believer of rationality as an approach to everything it is able to approach and the problem of widely using it may be the effort - the energy - it demands from the individual to be put into practice. In general, we humans tend to rely on ready-for-use concepts already approved by what is believed to be a trusted community and without revising them: I believe that 'I think, therefore I exist' is as easy to admit and put into action as 'I think, therefore I desist' (from thinking, of course, a paradoxical tenet, anyway, that is presumed true since being in 'action' seems to be one of the most praiseworthy values in our days); although this is not the case of 'I think, therefore I insist' (on thinking, obviously, a tenet that doesn't preclude 'action', mainly because thinking is 'acting' too).

Massimo: It seems to me to be the case that you and Shermer and Novella refer to different things when you speak of skepticism. Shermer and Novella refer to science education, promotion of science, debunking of woo and pseudoscience, and related topics. You seem to refer to a broader philosophical program.

Waldemar: It's not as if rationality is a very clearly defined word. Everyone claims to be rational. Catholics believe Thomas Aquinas produced rational arguments for believing in God. Ayn Rand claimed her philosophy is rational. The singularitarian crackpot Eliezer Yudkowsky claims he is rational. To talk of "rational" makes sense in specific contexts only where the wors is clearly defined. For example in economics, or in philosophy (where it is contrasted against empiricism).

Pyrrhus, in general I agree with you, since I suppose I was referring the same meaning in my bad English. Sorry for this. But, by the way, how many words are clearly defined? One can't prevent people from constantly discovering new uses for their vocabulary and maybe this be good for lexicographers and philosophers, since they forever have what to do (more or less in the same way it's good for doctors and dentists - and labs - that diseases exist). :(

I conceive rationality as a procedure constantly revising arguments supposedly describing something in the world (I tend to include the thought in this set) using some rules we more or less accept under the general name 'logic'. Broadly speaking it works as an imitation of causation - which we suppose to find in the world - and we name it entailment, and for the sake of which we care to not predicate contradictorily the propositions involved in it. Perhaps a simplification a little too much schopenhauerian, you'll think and I don't deny.

So, I do not oppose to rationally think God or a benevolent super AI, unless it is done in a way that is impossible for rationality to handle.

And yes, I believe we all think we're rational, at least until it's shown by someone else or by ourselves that we had not been that much or at all. Am I wrong?

> You can't expect everyone to happily go along with an appropriation of an existing word. <

That’s why there is such thing as education. We educate the public, about the non-lay meanings of the term skeptic, as well as the meaning of the term secular humanists, and so on.

Pyrrus,

> Shermer and Novella refer to science education, promotion of science, debunking of woo and pseudoscience, and related topics. You seem to refer to a broader philosophical program. <

But my program *includes* everything that Shermer and Novella want. What I object to is to the *equation* of skepticism to science. Most people in the skeptic movement are not scientists, they are doing something different, though science-informed.

«Philosophical naturalism is by far the most sound philosophical position about the nature of the world»

That is your opinion. I disagree philosophical naturalism is a reductive philosophy (necessarily false) that fails to account a variety of things that are crucial to the human being.

«it is supported any time that science makes a new discovery or produces a new successful theory»

In this sense scientific and technological achievements support any philosophy that acknowledges that science is the way to know nature. It supports metaphysical naturalism just as much as theism (that considers that the nature is regular and humans are able to find this regularity).

«It’s also proven every time a miracle doesn’t happen in your personal life.»

The miracles in my personal life just concern myself (I would appreciate if you could let such things to myself). Not you or science have nothing to do with such subjects.

«What else could you possibly want? When was the last time that a supernaturalist philosophy produced something like the iPhone?»

What I could want is you to do a more credible defense of philosophic naturalism (or at least some intellectual honesty). But here maybe I am just expecting too much.

«When was the last time that a supernaturalist philosophy produced something like the iPhone?»

Never, it is unreasonable to expect metaphysics to produce material objects, but then in the same way it was not philosophical naturalism that produced iPhone, that was technology.

"I disagree philosophical naturalism is a reductive philosophy (necessarily false) that fails to account a variety of things that are crucial to the human being."

Such as?

Can you tell us how one determines acts of intervention from acts of non-intervention? If I am sick and pray to a saint and I also go to a doctor, then I get well. How do I know if god intervened to heal me or if my immune system with the help of some antibiotics did it? Or a little of both?

This was a response to Massimo, and really it doesn’t concern you (and I don’t want to have this discussion with you). However I can comment your questions:

«Can you tell us how one determines acts of intervention from acts of non-intervention?»Clearly I am no specialist on this, and the only act of intervention I can claim to have witnessed is me believing I God (and being able to maintain such a belief), as I tend to be quite skeptical about the supernatural (since I can find no explanation for this, maybe it can qualify for a miracle).

« If I am sick and pray to a saint and I also go to a doctor, then I get well. How do I know if god intervened to heal me or if my immune system with the help of some antibiotics did it? Or a little of both?»In your case, as an atheist, I would say that is very unlikely that you would pray (it is slightly absurd), but nevertheless it wouldn’t hurt you. In any case you would attribute your healing to the antibiotics (which is reasonable).

You dodged michael's question about determining if a supernatural intervention has taken place. If you cannot propose a rational method of identifying divine interventions then the distinction between natural and supernatural dissolves, i.e. philosophical naturalism would include miracles.

An old story comes to mind: There was an old Greek who asked his woman to come outside with him, into the clear and starry night so as to show her the Universe he had found. As they stumbled along in the darkness, the man expounding on the truth he saw and thought he knew, he slipped and fell into a hole. The woman could not help herself and began to laugh. The old Greek looked up embarrassed and upset and said: why are you laughing, come help me out of this ditch. She responded: I laugh because you claim to know the Universe yet you fail to know what is in front of your own two feet.

I think science and religion, as most of mankind has fallen into a hole of uncertainty much like the old Greek, and sadly not humorously has yet to find its own true feet.